CHAPTER 16
Most of the investigations that led to Gareth riding to Derbyshire had occurred through the mail.
Over dinner at Chatsworth during Gareth’s visit there, the duke’s special secretary, Mr. Montley, had provided a few details hitherto unknown.
The most interesting information had been the name of the transport company hired to bring all those paintings north, Underhill’s of Ramsgate.
A query to Underhill’s in turn produced the names of the teamsters who drove the wagons. Underhill’s kept records in good English fashion, and even had the towns and parishes for those men. A few more letters and Gareth had the locations of two of them.
He rode into the village of Bellestream to pay a call on Mr. Ogden, who had moved north to live at an old family property after an ox kick had broken one of his legs two years earlier, ending his teamster days forever.
The property consisted of a small cottage on a spot of land hugging the edge of the village.
The ground flanking the walk to the door displayed the first shoots of the reawakening garden.
Mr. Ogden came to the door and eyed Gareth with curiosity and suspicion. Completely bald but with thick eyebrows over small eyes, Ogden appeared a hearty man of considerable girth that his waistcoat struggled to contain. The ox that took him on must have been very brave.
Gareth handed over his card and Ogden spent a long time peering at it before inviting him in.
Ogden limped to a nearby room and they settled on chairs in a sitting room full of patterns and frills.
Ogden gazed around as if he had never seen the place before and had suddenly realized how out of place he appeared.
“My aunt lived here till she died,” he said with a grin. Two of his teeth were missing. Another ox kick perhaps. “My days at the reins were over, so I moved here.”
“It is your days at the reins I want to talk about. I have been sent by an agent of Parliament to assist an inquiry by the Lords.”
“The House of Lords sent you? Well, now, that explains the oddness of a gentleman showing up at my cottage. Are the lords looking into the sorry state of the roads? I can bend your ear a good while on that.”
“I will inform them of your willingness and ability to give information on the roads. Right now, however, the inquiry regards the transportation of a large number of crates by the Underhill company some twenty years ago. They informed me you were one of the teamsters. This journey started near Ramsgate at the estate of one of the lords, and ended in Derbyshire at the property of another. There were five wagons.”
Ogden’s ham of a hand came down hard on his knee.
“I remember it well. Awkward crates, all different sizes. We were warned we would be drawn and quartered if we opened any, as if after sitting on a board all day we would be wanting to pry into the cargo. Lots of threats there were, and admonishments not to dally or detour or leave the wagons. We had to sleep right in with the crates, and take turns going to piss.”
“Did anyone inquire about the cargo, either before you set out or along the way?”
“Raised some interest, it did. Bound to when five big wagons lumber down the road in a line. Since we knew nothing, we had nothing to talk about though.”
“Come now. Did you not guess? The size and shape of those crates must have inspired some speculations for an experienced man like yourself.”
Ogden grinned. “If it’s my thinking you want—They reminded me of the time I transported a huge looking glass from the coast to London.
The special kind, like kings have in their palaces, not some polished metal or small curved thing.
Big and flat it was, and as tall as a ballroom, and crated up much like what I drove that journey.
So I said to myself, maybe this is a cargo of looking glasses, all different sizes, that the lord wants for his manor house.
” His eyebrows rose expectantly, waiting to hear if he were correct.
“You were very clever, and very close.” It sounded neat, and almost plausible, except it made no sense. Who would transport five wagons of plate looking glasses under secrecy? It came out too easily, too, as if Ogden had prepared the answer, in anticipation of being asked about it one day.
“I must ask a few pointed questions now. It would help if you answered directly and simply. You will not be in any trouble if an answer is not what may be considered the correct one. Do you understand?”
Ogden nodded.
“Did you in fact stay with the wagons the whole way? Were you at any time away from the others?”
“As I said, when I had to piss.”
“Longer than that.”
Ogden chuckled. “Well, sometimes I had to do more than piss, sir.”
“Of course. Longer yet. Long enough for someone to have in some way affected some scheme regarding that cargo.”
He shook his head. “Not possible.” He shook it again, vigorously. His hand rubbed his knee.
Gareth waited. Ogden squirmed.
“Well, there was that one night . . .” he muttered.
“I did not leave my post, mind you. One of the others went to a tavern for some ale and returned with a nice little keg, and I enjoyed my cups, as it were. I crawled under my wagon to sleep it off. Dead to the world, I was. We all were, I suppose, until well after dawn.”
And there it was, the broken link in the chain of secrecy, subterfuge, and careful plans. A keg of ale had undone it all, and now there was no way to know if the crates that arrived in Derbyshire even had pictures in them.
One of those lords should have gone along with the wagons, or sent a trusted man with these teamsters.
Probably all those days on the dusty roads plodding along with oxen did not appeal to any of the gentlemen, so they all convinced themselves it was unnecessary, providing sufficient threats were made.
This little inquiry of Ives had just become harder.
“The other teamsters, Mr. Ogden—were they friends of yours?”
“We got on well enough after a day or so, but I was the odd man out. Underhill employed all the others. I was brought in from Margate because he needed an extra man. He kept me on, so he must have liked the looks of me.”
Gareth had nothing else to ask. He rose to take his leave, and Ogden limped along back to the door.
“What was in those crates, if I may ask, sir?”
“Pictures.”
Ogden’s face fell in surprise. “You don’t say. I’ll be damned. All that trouble for a bunch of pictures.”
“Amazing, isn’t it?”
Ogden shook his head in astonishment. Gareth returned to his horse, not believing for a second that Ogden had been ignorant of the contents of the crates.
* * *
“This is a surprise,” Gareth said when he entered his library at Albany Lodge and found Ives sitting there.
“I had hoped to arrive before you went north to see that teamster, so I could join you. When I found you had already left, I decided to wait here.”
Gareth poured them both brandy, then sat and told Ives about his meeting with Ogden. Ives was not pleased to hear about that keg of ale.
“Hell.”
“Yes.”
Ives contemplated for a moment, his brow clear of furrows but his eyes hooded.
“A switch cannot be ruled out, but it would be a most elaborate scheme, planned in advance by someone who knew everything. And dependent on those men getting so drunk they slept through it all. I do not like this possibility being there, but I think it is unlikely.”
“I am assuming one or more of them were part of the plan, and that keg was no accident. If Underhill employed them, they may have heard something long before they took up those reins. Not so unlikely then.”
“When you come up to town, we will ride out to Ramsgate and talk to Underhill. Now that you have opened this new front in the war, we need to see what he is made of. When will you be in town?”
“I plan to start out day after tomorrow.”
Ives gazed into his brandy. “And when will your guests arrive?”
“The next day, I expect.”
Ives looked over with a small, knowing smile. “Which one are you after? The married one? Please do not tell me it is the young innocent. Even we have our standards, and you always said girls bore you.”
“Have no fear, I do not intend to launch a scandal from Langley House.”
“So, not the young girl. Then—?”
Gareth scowled at him, annoyed. “The truth is I am pursuing the husband. Wesley Rockport has a business that is growing fast. He is at the point where men start buying culture.”
“So you plan long strolls through the gallery at Langley House, to impress upon him the need for a collection.”
“I don’t intend to say a word about it. The gallery will speak for itself.”
“Be aware that Lance and I may be in residence some of the time they are there. Lance chafes at being rusticated and may insist on coming up to town again.”
“I will keep them all out of your way.”
“I insist on meeting them, especially if the ladies are pretty.”
“By all means,” Gareth said coolly. “They are both pretty enough, but not your style. Nor do I want the husband calling you out. These industrialists are not like us. They actually love their wives and react badly when someone attempts to seduce them.”
Ives took the warning in stride, but curiosity lowered his lids again.
“Devonshire should be coming up to town for the Season, I expect,” Ives said, changing the subject. “Certainly his mother will be there, and his bastard brother. I will ask Prinny to smooth the path for us to talk to the latter two.”
“If you are there to do it, you do not need me.”
“I would like you there. Then we can compare our reactions and perceptions later. I would want to be very sure further inquiries in that direction were called for before I began them.” Ives stood and stretched.
He looked around the sparsely furnished chamber.
“You do have an extra bed here, don’t you? ”
“One. It is yours if you want it.”
“No servants, however. Damn, I should have brought one from Merrywood.”